I believe Alef Aeronautics’ flying car is an expensive and overly ambitious roadable aircraft. With its complex design, limited practicality, and likely $1 million price tag, it joins other companies producing futuristic but currently silly vehicles, such as:
Terrafugia Transition, PAL-V Liberty, Klein Vision AirCar, Samson, Switchblade, and the, Jetson ONE.
While these companies offer exciting technologies, their products often face high costs and practical challenges, appealing more to the very same niche market than everyday consumers.
How is this supposed to fly at all? There’s no visible means of vertical thrust or aerodynamic lift to be seen on that picture. It seems the flying car will remain the elusive oddity it has been since its inception almost a century ago. (And I’m not even sure any of the electric flying taxis touted around the world will become a practicable reality.)
As always, I wish all market entrants much success. They need to diverge from both the historical data and the current trend which indicate that, relative to the cheaper alternatives, flying cars are lousy cars and lousy aircraft.
So 300k is the “expected price.” Translating that from dreamer money to actual money, then factor in inflation, production delays, actual certification, um, carry the 1. Plus pilot training. Then the sale of the company after bankruptcy when certification doesn’t happen. Add 20% because their power plant didn’t work. And round up.
2.7 million dollars! You will have to check my math.
The website doesn’t list a power plant other than electric. Doesn’t say how it produces lift. How it travels down the road. How it meets highway standards. Nor flight standards. Nor certification plans and what country they will start certification in. No flight control solutions. No crash standards. How it will have airbags. But they will take your $150 to order one so I guess that part of the process has been fleshed out.
Call it a flivver, a Rube Goldberg, a contraption, or a machine, but not an airplane. As long as it is 100% privately funded, good luck to them. Hope they sell more than past so-called flying cars, an oxymoron as far as this pilot is concerned.
The innovation is impressive, despite all the valid skepticism. Contrast the VC-driven flying cars to some renowned aircraft designers. Like the French engineer Rene Fournier, who wanted a simple motorglider for personal use, that evolved into the lovely and still popular RF-series of aircraft. Or Italian Stelio Frati, who defined how a sleek airplane should look back in the 1950s, for instance the SF-260 or Falco, still head-turners on any ramp. Or former Van’s Aircraft Chief Engineer Ken Krueger, who debuted a new design by flying a few examples unannounced to Oshkosh, ready for sale, no outside investors needed. Some years ago, while attended Oshkosh with my son, we were given tickets to a swank reception during the height of the Icon A5 hype. The adult beverages, served by scantily-clad young ladies, was flowing and the spirits were high. While waiting on a beer at the bar, I spoke with one of the Icon investors, who looked anything but happy. He simply said “I will never get my money back out of this.”
I think I see some propellers under the screen of the auto body. I don’t see enough propellers or large enough to actually carry this… aircraft… much less any occupants. Where is the gimbal? Is it exposed to the elements? How is it lubricated and maintained? If it always keeps the occupants level, what happens in a high speed (ha ha) turn? So just like in Grandpa’s Cadillac everyone slides to one side of the flying car?
Dunno, I like the way boats and airplanes work in a (coordinated) turn, always keeping gravity pointing down.
One thing that rarely gets discussed about these “flying cars” is their actual use as a car. This brings up some interesting questions and most likely would be one of the main reasons for their failure in the marketplace. First, with the crowded highways of today and the always increasing auto accident rate, it is inevitable that one will be in an accident on the highway. Who fixes it, an A&P or the local body shop? Will they need to use FAA type certified parts to fix a fender bender? If it gets a door ding or bump on the rear bumper, does it need an A&P to inspect it for airworthiness? Who will insure it? Will insurance even be available for a vehicle that goes in the air and on the road? Will it be affordable? Will it be safe to ride in as a car? In the small airplanes I fly, I am not sure any of them would be survivable on the highway with other vehicles traveling at highway speeds.
Making a vehicle that flies and can maneuver on the road is one thing, But making it fly in the air and be useful and safe on the highway is an entirely different problem. I would doubt they could make one meet highway safety standards and still be flyable.
With Uber, Lyft and rentals available at almost every airport, I doubt there will ever be any economical justification for these vehicles. If it does come about, it will be as a toy for the ultra-rich.
3200 pre-orders and no final design yet?
Whilst I’m commonly dismissive of such new projects, the scope of this one is sounding to be darn near criminal.
There is a serious lack of engineering scrutiny associated with this project. There will be an inordinate amount of skin and interference drag associated with the vehicle shell. As for the flight deck, besides the complexity of the gimballed mount, has anyone ever hear of separation drag. The resulting drag components will severely limit both its speed and thrust efficiency in flight.
Taking orders before you have a flying model is a scam common in small aircraft startups and saying they will have a flying production unit by the end of 2025 (article in Edge) is totally unrealistic when they have yet to even fly a full scale prototype at this point in time. Inside Alef Aeronautics, the company trying to build a car you can both drive and fly
Something can be said for the aesthetics of the design but the reality of it ever becoming a flying car is severely limited by the aerodynamic design.
This is going to be a major issue for flying cars for a long time, as they may be limited to mostly ground use for quite a while. The dream of just pulling one out of your garage and flying to your office is a long way off, as it will be quite a while before an effective system of managing tens of thousands (or more) of them flying low over cities during commute hour is in place.
Given this, a flying car that can only fly and not drive on the road will be nearly useless except in very niche circumstances. These hybrid ones that can both fly and drive on the road will probably improve over time, but why pay such a large price for one when it will be used mostly on the road and has very limited flying range.
Two replies; both of which assume that flying, not driving, will be the primary use case:
Weather proofing. I think that one of Murphy’s reverse corollaries says that the odds of something going wrong decreases in direct proportion to the level of your preparations. If you can drive home, the predicted storm won’t even happen.
Storage. I don’t own a plane, but if I did, storing it in my garage could be a very nice option. Driving it would be limited to back and forth to my home airport - I’d probably use Uber or a rental if I was running around at the destination point. A trailerable, folding plane would be another option,albeit with the same highway damage potential.
[These comments apply to roadable aircraft in general; not to this particular design.]
I tend to agree with this. Rather than flying cars with very limited flying range, I think it might be better to put the effort into leveraging battery and electric motor technology to add VTOL or near-VTOL capabilities to current fixed-wing GA aircraft. The result would be airplanes that are likely to be safer with the ability to operate out of very small airports but still used for longer distance travel. Potentially they could also be made drivable or at least trailerable with folding wings.
